I am sorry Epstein; I have seen the end of the publishing business as we know it. I just watched an iPhone commercial in which one of our friendly fingers was paging through 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. I have to believe, copyright issues notwithstanding, that this marks a crucial step towards the complete digitization of books. On a previous iPhone commercial they demonstrated how the phone could analyze a fragment of a song and connect the user to the iTunes store where the album could be purchased. What’s stopping this from being applied to text? I am greatly anticipating the time when I can read the New York Times Book Review, on their website via my phone of course, and immediately be connected to an online bookstore so that I can purchase the hottest new titles. Given these new possibilities, perhaps Apple should create something like iMedia. Similar to what Epstein conceptualized as a publishing conglomerate, filtered through online marketplaces, the opportunities afforded Apple could lead to the eventual creation of localized sites that cater to every interest of every consumer, be it Peruvian pan-flute music, the newest blockbuster action movie, or digital copies of text books.
What I find terribly ironic is that the iPhone answers Epstein’s complaint, and the subsequent voracity of his belief that printed text will never become an extinct expression of technology, by providing digital books with which a reader can still fulfill some sort of tactile experience. It is true that holding an iPhone loaded with your favorite novels and poetry will never equal the sensory experience of standing in a room filled with those same books. I guess we just have to ask ourselves whether it is a fair trade-off to lose the experience of the smell and feel of a book in exchange for having access to the most extensive library imaginable in our front pocket. For me, the answer is a resounding yes and my interest is piqued as to how these technologies will continue to unfold and change our day-to-day lives.
It’s a Beeping Problem
2 months ago
Ian, this is very interesting. Just last week I heard a story on the NPR show On the Media about the evolution of cell phones in Japan. Apparently, because cell phones developed earlier in Japan, and broadband internet was adopted later, people in Japan tend to browse the internet, read, and do pretty much everything comptuer-related on a cell phone. The transcript of the story is available here. But here's the money quote:
ReplyDeleteIn the U.S. we've been upgrading our cell phones with the hope of recreating the Internet experience we've had for years on the computer. In Japan, since the cell phone has traditionally been the gateway to the Internet, the evolution has instead been in the incremental improvement of the cell phone network and hardware.
But even if our cell phones are on different paths, some of Japan’s hardware features may start popping up in our phones soon.